


This Tomb of my Heart Turned Happiness to Dust

by Neurotoxia



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Established Relationship, Infinity War Speculation, M/M, Post-Break Up, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-27
Updated: 2017-07-27
Packaged: 2018-12-07 11:57:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11623023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neurotoxia/pseuds/Neurotoxia
Summary: For all that Tony likes to dub himself a futurist, he did not envision his reunion with Steve to go this way.





	This Tomb of my Heart Turned Happiness to Dust

**Author's Note:**

> [crookedspoon]() prompted me with 'breathless', I had the intention of writing something domestic, and somehow this happened. At its core, this is probably not a happy story. Many thanks to my enabler crookedspoon who turned this from garbage into not quite gold, but into something that doesn't give off a funky smell if you get too close.
> 
> Feel free to yell at me in the comments ;)

Tony’s had a whole litany ready. A rousing speech, arguments, accusations, lined up carefully for maximum effect and then filed away in the recess of his mind to be used at the right time. Whenever that would be. It’s not like Steve left him an itinerary before he fucked off to Wakanda. But Tony had been ready, and once the day came, he'd have intended to march before Steve and bring receipts. He'd been expecting to be able to rage at Steve, wanted – no, needed – to remind him that once, Steve promised not to be like everyone else. 

That he wasn’t going to leave. 

And Tony, desperate and starved fool that he is, almost believed him. Believed that maybe, he gets to be happy after all, that he too gets to have good things. Howard’s disappointed voice faded into the background, the voice that whispered in his ear that he was a disappointment and a nuisance. Tony hates proving Howard right.

Then Laos happened, and Berlin happened, and Siberia happened; and Steve did what he promised he wouldn’t. He left Tony behind with a broken suit and the heart to match, the taste of blood and ash on his tongue. He can’t help but notice the parallels to his current situation.

Tony hadn't foreseen being breathless when confronted with the reality of Steve. He had seen himself slinging choice words or none at all, choosing to be silent instead. Not like this, lying prone on the rubble of an apartment block, the new arc reactor crushed and extinguished (and isn’t it ironic he had to go back to wearing it in his chest after his heart got progressively worse following the Accords fiasco). The housing is cracked, spiderwebs crawling over the glass that failed to protect the reactor. Phantom shrapnel claws its way through his tissue towards his weak, struggling, and faltering heart. Tony tastes the sharp iron of blood flooding his mouth. It swims in his lungs. His body valiantly tries to remain functional, to breathe oxygen, to keep him alive as long as possible. It’s as stubborn as his mind is, but this time, there is no Yinsen to stop him from bleeding out.

Peter is there, mask torn away and face streaked with soot. Tony is half delirious with the pain, the blood loss and the lack of oxygen, but he sees the blurred features of Peter’s terrified face, hears the choked apologies. 

“Tony, I’m sorry,” he sobs over and over, and Tony tries to tell him it’s not his fault, but the words drown in the blood. 

It was Tony’s decision to take the hit meant for Peter. He failed to keep Peter out of the fight, the least he could do is keep his promise to May to do everything he can to protect him. If it means dying, Tony will do that, too. 

He doesn’t mind. 

Peter’s a great kid, he deserves to grow up and grow old. Tony doesn’t think he did much to deserve growing old. He tried. If leaving the world in the hands of heroes like Peter is meant to be his legacy, he could have done worse. His money will go to the Avengers anyway, it’s been set up that way for a long time. It’s the best he can leave behind for them.

Despite the flames licking at the brick and concrete around him, Tony feels the clammy sweat on his face, helmet long ripped away. Cold has crept into his very bones and his body twitches in the mangled remains of the armour. Oxygen deprivation and blood loss make themselves known, winning the battle against Tony’s stubborn body bit by bit. 

Not long now. 

Tony isn’t a doctor or biologist, but he knows statistics and stochastic processes. Even his hazy mind can calculate he’s rapidly running out of time. The others should be able to finish off Thanos. The last he heard through his now broken comms was that the tide of the battle was turning to their advantage. Peter shouldn’t waste time crouching by his side. Tony has nearly died alone more than once, it seems appropriate he should do exactly that in the end. 

Yet, he’s indescribably grateful he doesn’t have to, whether it makes him a coward or not.

It’s when Tony hears Steve’s panicked voice that he thinks he’s starting to hallucinate, conjuring Steve to his side because he hasn’t got it in him to die resenting Steve. During the last team update, Steve was miles and miles away, making his way towards ground zero by increments, slowed down over and over by Thanos’ interference. 

But there’s no mistaking the ocean blue of Steve’s eyes when they appear in front of his blurred vision. He’s reminded that he hasn’t seen Steve in over a year and it’s another cut to his already dying heart. 

_A beard, huh?_ It suits him, Tony thinks idly, his mind clinging to the last reserves of clarity. 

The remainder of the armour is torn away, jolting Tony but he’s stopped feeling the pain of broken bones and ripped flesh a while ago. His body feels wrapped in cotton, sensations barely reaching him. Tony hears Steve talk, registers the cadence of terror in his voice, even if he can’t parse the sounds into words. Peter’s voice flares up occasionally, but it's just as garbled to Tony’s ears.

Steve is here. Steve has really come for Tony. 

Tony doesn’t remember a word of the speeches he’s had lined up in his mind, all the things he wanted to throw at Steve’s head for leaving him behind, for not even listening to him. All he wants to tell Steve is that he loves him, despite the months they were apart, despite the bitterness and the secrets. He tries to say it while his vision grows ever darker, black spots blotting whatever was left of his sight. The blood that filled his lungs doesn’t let him.

Steve lifts him from the rubble and shifts him around, through not by much. The angle changes, he looks up at Steve’s face. As if through dense fog, Tony notices his left hand gathered in Peter’s small, slender grip. Steve’s hand covers the broken reactor and Tony can see the shock play over Steve’s features. He never even knew Tony went back to wearing it.

Tony’s ears ring. He’s out of time, he knows he is. It’s his last chance to let Steve know what he never managed to tell him before, always resting in the knowledge that Steve knew what Tony felt.

A last ditch effort, but the world folds in on itself, collapses into a final moment of bright light and Steve’s eyes.

With the last beat of his heart, Tony hears it.

_I love you, too._

**Author's Note:**

> Title is taken from Swallow the Sun's "From Happiness to Dust".


End file.
